Newswise — Your child may have been an excellent student in high school, but don’t assume he or she will have an easy transition to college, says Laurie L. Hazard, a scholar of first-year-student transitions.
Hazard, a psychology professor at Bryant University in Rhode Island who studies and writes about student personality types and classroom success, says reason for this can often be hard for many actively engaged parents to swallow:
"Today's parents are more directly involved in their children's lives, more involved in their school work and daily programs than ever before. They overschedule their kids with daily activities, help them with homework, closely monitor their progress in the classroom and on the playing field. It can be really hard for many of them to let go of this control. It can also be confusing for students who no longer have this management situation in their lives when they start college, and even more difficult for those who do."
First-year students need to combat procrastination and "learn how to self-regulate" and manage their own homework and reading assignments, she says. "Parents can do their new college student a huge favor by understanding that this time represents a developmental shift in their child's life," she notes. "Transitioning your relationship from an adult-child to an adult-adult relationship will help immensely.”
Hazard teaches and designs curricula for increasingly popular first-year experience programs now gearing up on college campuses across the country. She also assesses these programs for their effectiveness.
"One important lesson that many of these programs fail to emphasize is the importance of making friends during your first semester - and the impact that the kind of friends you make can have on your success in college," she says. For example, "it's very easy for procrastinators to attract other procrastinators, and too many students become friends with other students who can, and too often do, aid them in sabotaging their own academic success,” she says.
Hazard co-wrote "Foundations for Learning" (2006, Prentice Hall), which is designed to help students make a successful transition to college. She is the recipient of a "Top 10 Outstanding First-Year Student Advocate" award, co-sponsored by the University of South Carolina's National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition.
Hazard initially penned the textbook for Bryant University's required class for all incoming first-year students; it has since been adopted by other colleges and universities around the country.
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